


let it go(let it roll right off your shoulders)

by tangomarine



Series: i can’t love you [1]
Category: Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: James is conflicted, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-08
Updated: 2019-04-08
Packaged: 2020-01-06 14:58:42
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 333
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18390725
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tangomarine/pseuds/tangomarine
Summary: At first, it was heaven. A giddy high, and James would never come down.Then it was hell - a simmering fire that made his heart shatter and his blood boil at the same time.Now, he’s on his own, struggling to cope with his anger and raw hurt, and the realization that the thing he cherished most was a goddamn stupid façade.





	let it go(let it roll right off your shoulders)

**Author's Note:**

> Basically, James and Thomas were engaged but Thomas had cheated with Hamilton. This is the aftermath.

He burns everything.  
Every single letter, one by one. He takes his lighter and touches the flame to the corner of the paper, watches the flames lick over the “Dearest James,” to the “All my heart, Thomas Jefferson” and pretends he doesn’t care that it wasn’t real. He gets rid of all the pictures too, deleting them but not before printing out copies to burn. He gets a sick kind of satisfaction from it, from watching all the lies turn to ash, purging his life of the poison that was so irresistibly sweet.  
It still is.  
That just makes him hate it more. So he burns the letters and the photographs and the blue cashmere scarf Thomas gave him, his personal favorite. He finds all the pens Thomas gave him, the ones he still has, and breaks them just to watch them bleed ink in various colors all over his hands, staining them.  
Like Hamilton’s.  
He meets him in a coffee shop one day, a while after he moved out and tried to forget, and stops himself from being mad. It’s not like it was Hamilton’s fault.  
Hamilton watches him get up to leave, and touches his shoulder to stop him. He doesn’t say anything, just holds out a sky-blue cashmere scarf, identical to the one James had burned. “Pretending it never happened doesn’t stop it from hurting,” he says. “Moving on does.”  
James scowls. “Who are you to talk?”  
Hamilton shrugs. “No one, I guess. But I do know that getting hung up on these kinds of things only serves to put the burden of their mistakes on you, and you’re the last person who deserves to carry all this forever.”  
James says nothing.  
Hamilton presses the scarf on him and leaves with an only slightly sarcastic “Fare thee well, Madison,” tossed over his shoulder.  
That night, James thinks about what he had said.  
Perhaps, just this once, Hamilton is right.  
He makes a mental note to thank him for the scarf.

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first fic, don’t hate me. Comments are appreciated. I’m planning on posting prequels


End file.
